The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1887-04-28
AMERICAN AGRICULTURE.

III AO 1~
not been a very prosperous n for
those who devote a large share Of
their labor to the raising of wheat,
and the crop of the previous year,
though abundant in quantity, sold at
so low a price that the farmer was
much disheartened. But his embar-
easements are in a large measure due
to mistakes which he himself can
remedy, if he will. Certainly the
experience of the past few years ought
to lead to an earnest and determined
effort to improve the methods of agri-
culture in this country, so that the
prosperity Of this great industry may
depend less than it does upon the pro-
duction Of a few chief staples for dis
tant markets.
The farmer, as we'll as the country,
needs Investigation of industry, and
greater economy in production. He
needs to produce at less cost than
hitherto, and to adapt production o
nearly to the demands Of the home
market, and to become himself a
ufacturer as we'll as a farmer, turn
ing out less of the raw materials called
corn, hay or wheat, and more of the
finished products, cattle, hogs, butter
cheese, poultry and eggs. In the
youth of agriculture here, with a vir-
gin soil apparently of inexhaustible
fertility, the farmer naturally devoted
his attention first to the production Of
grain, for which there was a ready
market, and which could be produced
with least delay. Crude and wasteful
methods were tolerated, because the
unwearied soil yielded abundantly with
little labor and no fertilizing. Land
was plenty, and if the soil began to
wear out the farmer would always
move further West, to cultivate new
land again after the old methods.
Thus agriculture has been sweeping
across the country, so to speak, scratch
ing the surface and ~wastefully ex-
hausting the soil, but nowhere develop
ing economy in production, mol giving
due attention to that diversity of labor
and of production which will secure
the best results in the long run. But
the advancing settler from the East
now meets in Montana the advancing
settler from the Pacific coast. The
of unoccupied land is rapidly
narrowing. Enormous distance from
the markets renders the farmer too
dependent on lines of transportation,
and too exclusive attention to the
raising of wheat, corn and cotton
places him at the mercy of foreign
markets and governments. The
changes of tariff by Germany and
France within the past year warn the
American farmer that he can no longer
afford to neglect those improvements
and developments of his industry
which are necessary to render it per
manently prosperous and independent.
1t is time to remember that the
more thorough and skilful culture is
often the cheaper, that it costs less
per bushel to raise twenty-five bushels
of wheat to the acre than to raise
twelve bushels. It is time to remem-
Der, too, that the farmer who has to
employ hands all the year, in order to
have their services during the summer
months only, wastes a part of his pro-
ductive force if he fails to so diversity
his industry that his labor may be as
far as possible employed in the winter
also. 1t is a poor profit that he can
get on his corn when the crop is as
large and the price is as low as it is
this year. But if he can add the
profits of a manufacturer to his profits
as a producer, and turn his corr and
other products into hogs and cattle
through the winter months, he will
find both his fields and his pocket ep-
Every winter, consumers pay
high prices for meats, butter, cheese
and eggs, because there are but few
farmers who wisely keep the machin-
cry Of production running the year
round. Yet wen in the older States,
where soil is scanty and most worn,
some men of shrewdness and science,
by diversified and we'll distributed
industry adapted to the wants of the
community, secure profits which the
great wheat farmers Of the West can
not in the long run surpass. Not
long ago, in a scientific association. a
paper was read maintaining that, even